Battle of Chattanooga

Following the disaster at Chickamauga, General William S. Rosecrans was replaced in command of Union forces at Chattanooga, Tennessee, by General Ulysses S. Grant, who immediately set about raising the siege of the city, which Confederate General Braxton Bragg and the Army of Tennessee had invested. Fought November 23-25, 1863, the Battle of Chattanooga resulted in a resounding victory for Grant and the Union as elements of three Union armies defeated Bragg in successive actions at Orchard Knob on the 23rd, Lookout Mountain on the 24th, and Missionary Ridge on the 25th. The fighting at Lookout Mountain is remembered romantically as the “Battle Above The Clouds,” and with the capture of Missionary Ridge Union forces established a firm base for the Atlanta Campaign that was undertaken in the spring of 1864.

Led by the impetuous General Nathaniel Lyon, Union forces pursued retreating Confederates across southwestern Missouri in the summer of 1861. At Wilson’s Creek, Lyon caught up with the enemy on aptly named Bloody Hill.